Leading supermarket chain Sainsbury‘s has signed a new long-term contract with loyalty scheme Nectar, it has been announced today.
Sainsbury‘s is a founding member of the Nectar programme which, since its launch in 2002, has grown into the UK‘s largest loyalty points programme in the UK with 11.5 million active users.
Like other leading supermarkets, Sainsbury‘s benefits from loyalty schemes by collecting information on its customers shopping habits each time they pay using the a discount card, and then uses this information to make strategic decisions.
Justin King, CEO of Sainsbury‘s, commented on the deal: “We‘re delighted to reaffirm our commitment to the UK‘s largest and most popular loyalty program. Nectar has played an important role in our continued success.
“Our unrivalled insight into shopper behaviour means we can help customers by giving them offers and promotions on the items they buy every day, while the scheme provides numerous ways to collect and redeem.”
This renewed deal with Nectar comes at a time when promotions and deals are proving increasingly important to UK grocery, with squeezed consumer spending impacting sales at even the biggest operators in the market.
Tesco, the UK‘s largest retailer, reported a 2.3 per cent fall in like-for-like trading over Christmas which followed the company‘s decision to scrap double points on its Clubcard loyalty scheme in order to pay for its Big Pice Drop offer launched in September.
During Christmas £100 million worth of points were redeemed at Sainsbury‘s by Nectar customers, making it a record performance for the loyalty scheme.
